In addition to his glowing praise for Kawhi Leonard (“I think he’s going to be a star. And as time goes on, he’ll be the face of the Spurs I think”), Pop was in candid mode in every sense imaginable. It’s what has made him one of the best reluctant interview subjects of all time in any sport.

After all, when is the last time you heard anyone use the phrase “wing-dingers?”

Joseph Kuhl
Location: Austin, TX
Question: What advice do you have for aspiring basketball coaches (other than get Tim Duncan as your centerpiece)?

GP: Buy a coat and a tie, and get a job.

Ryan
Location: Los Angeles
Question: Who are some of your favorite musical artists, and any amazing live shows you’ve seen come to mind?
GP: The last live show I’ve seen was Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young. And they’re still one of my favorites, you know the old stand-bys. I was a big Motown guy for a long time, being from that part of the country, and that sort of morphed into Jimmy Hendrix, Crosby Stills Nash & Young, Led Zepplin, those kind of guys. And being here in Texas you can’t help but hear country music here and there. Everybody takes a different path in life and about three years ago I started listening to a Patsy Cline album and it just blew me away. I just am still amazed by her voice, and the guys and my family say “jeez, are we going to listen to that again?” So that’s the newest one, and another one: Terri Clark. Somebody gave me a CD by her, a country gal, and I love it. It’s really great. So I listen to that, and everything else is sort of foreign. It’s Egyptian, Usef, he’s an Egyptian guy, or Turkish music. That kind of thing. So pretty strange, a lot of different things.

What about any of Stephen Jackson’s?

Jack used to try to give me some of his tapes, but, first of all I couldn’t even understand what was going on, and some of them you could even dance to, but once I started hearing what they were saying and everything I just gave them back.

Wifey has Fifty Shades of Grey loaded and ready for the beach over this long holiday weekend.

Legend, amazing how the Spurs continue to find the players who fit together. Can’t wait to see the new editions this year. Khawi taking on more. Manu a Flopper? Are you kidding me? He will take more fouls without calls than anybody in the League! Go Pop!

He can bring his team into the promise land without a superfriends like what the miami did. He’s truelly a very talented coach. An underdog but always on the top. The aging spurs still the team to beat in the west. Lakers, watch out. 🙂

I’m not a Thunder fan, but I’d say them making it to the Finals last year makes them the team to beat in the West- despite them sort of unraveling before the Heat. Pop is a great Coach, but I don’t see what the superfriends have to do with anything here- they won a title, get over it and stop making everything about the Heat.

true, Jerry Sloan was also a great one but he never won a championship cause he never really had any star players other than Malone and Stockton. Coaching only makes up half of it. Doc was okay especially for a guy who set a team’s record for steals in a single game. Popovich is a great one and so were the Spurs other than Manu being a flopper at times and the retired Bruce Bowen using his Kung Fu foot defense ‘unintentially’

Pop is the last of the great ones. Coaching is half the battle to win championships unless you are blessed with players who are students of the game to help get you over the finsish line. Amazing what he has done for that organization year after year.